As an organization, you want to be welcoming. To everyone. You want visitors or customers to have a good experience when they visit you. That is why you continuously work on improving your website, products, building, or public space. You work with personas and satisfaction surveys, bring in the best experts for your website design, and delve into the latest insights in the fields of interior design, lighting, and construction.
But are you also aware of people who use your services in a different way?
One in five people in the Netherlands has a disability. They use a wide range of services just as much, albeit in a different way. Consider, for example, someone using your website with speech software. Or a visitor in a wheelchair, or someone who struggles with language and hearing.
For these people, many websites, locations, and facilities are not user-friendly or accessible. What a waste. Not only for the user, but also for your organization. As a result, you ultimately reach fewer visitors or customers, and these visitors have a negative customer experience.
Accessible to everyone
An accessibly designed product or service enables more people to use it. The environment is designed and built in such a way that it can be used by everyone.
For example, a website can also be operated using a keyboard instead of just the mouse. A building can be entered on foot as well as with an aid. And a pedestrian crossing is safe for everyone, including someone who cannot hear or see. Accessible products and services can be used independently by everyone, with or without a disability.
Read more about digital accessibility
Read more about physical accessibility
Whether someone can use a product does not directly determine whether they will use it. A technically accessible website may simultaneously not be user-friendly. For example, because the text is too difficult or the design is illogical. The best way to discover this is by involving end users and experts by experience in this process.
Read more about user research
An environment that is both accessible and user-friendly is ideal. Inclusive design is the key here. By combining user-friendliness with accessibility, you ensure that your product, service, or location is used and usable. In other words, designing with and for end users.
Together with our partners and clients, we are working towards an inclusive society that is accessible to everyone.
For the broader standards foundation behind this work, the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative is a strong starting point, and our WCAG 2.2 explained guide goes deeper into the digital side of accessibility.